Do You Work in a Sandbox?By Admin

March 17, 2010

No one wants to go to a sandbox everyday…unless you’re a kid.

It seems like every company has at least one reporter. By that I mean the employee who goes around and gets all the gossip they can find about all the other employees and reports it to the entire office. No matter if it’s true or not, especially if it’s really embarrassing. It makes them feel important.

There are also the troublemakers. These are the ones who look for any and every reason to make other employees look incompetent or lazy. They are usually the ones who complain the most about being over worked and under paid, when in reality they are constantly looking for reasons not to work. Their living is made by making every other employee look bad, in turn making themselves look like a hero to managers who have no idea what’s really going on.

We have all been on both sides of the gossip wall before. Ideally there should be no gossip at all, but that is nearly impossible in a work environment. We are all human and it will happen. There is however a difference between harmless conversation and constant gossip and negative spotlighting. It does make a difference in how people look at others and even though you are the one talking about someone else… they will look at you differently too.

What to do? Number one is your work of course. If you are doing your job no one will have any reason to gossip or complain about you and you won’t have time to gossip or complain yourself. Number two, always think before you speak. What you say changes more than you think. Stay positive…like mom always said “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all”. Finally if there is a real issue, take it up with a manager. They are the ones responsible for handling any issues with employees. You aren’t a hero for complaining.

Do you work in a sandbox? What kind of double agents and issues do you deal with?

Great article Rachel! Unfortunatley it is not adult behavior to throw sand or do other things in the sandbox, yet people still do them….. The more you stay out of the sandbox and keep others out, eventually everyone will take the hint. No sandboxes allowed here!